


a master's in reverse psychology

by ghostsoldier



Category: Glee
Genre: Angst, Bullying, Consent Issues, Episode Related, Gen, Homophobic Language, M/M, One-Sided Relationship, second season
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-29
Updated: 2012-08-29
Packaged: 2017-11-13 03:54:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,163
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/499173
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ghostsoldier/pseuds/ghostsoldier
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dave always manages to say the wrong thing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a master's in reverse psychology

**Author's Note:**

> After 2x06, I started writing something fairly slow and sweet that was more about the development of their non-antagonism, friendship, and eventual relationship, but, uh, then 2x07 happened and there was creepy winking and homophobic slurs and _death threats_ (what the hell, Karofsky?) and so I wrote this instead. Originally written and posted in 2010.
> 
> Warnings: I think the tags cover it, but if this need additional warnings please feel free to let me know.

Later, Dave wishes he could take it back.  
  
It's not that he's never threatened anyone's life before. It's practically expected when you're a jock. Hell, he can think up death threats in his sleep, although they're usually not as awesome the next morning when he tries them out in school. But this -- this _thing_ with Kurt -- is different.   
  
It would be so much easier if Kurt was the one who started it. Dave tries to tell himself that Kurt _did_ start it, what with all the prancing around the hallways dressed like a sparkly fruitcake and singing about his feelings all the time, but no matter which way Dave twists it in his head, Kurt had pretty much waved a giant sign that said "I DON'T LIKE YOU AND THIS IS WHY" right in his face and Dave, like an idiot, had kissed him anyway.  
  
(Was he expecting Kurt to kiss back? He replays it in his mind over and over, and he still can’t figure it out. He can’t seem to figure out anything where Kurt is concerned.)   
  
He waited for the story to make the rounds, because obviously Kurt was going to tell his stupid glee friends about what happened and once the Cheerios knew, it would reach critical mass in less than half an hour and everyone would know. He'd even thought up a cover story about how the little fag had come onto _him_ : everyone knew Kurt mooned over the jocks anyway, what did they expect?   
  
But Kurt didn't say anything.   
  
He still hasn’t.  
  
Dave’s not entirely sure how he’s supposed to process that.  
  
The worst part is he won’t get out of Dave’s head, and that Dave _does_ blame him for. It’s unforgivable, that’s what it is, and he knows he can get past it if he tries hard enough, but Kurt’s just always there in the halls and in his mind and he can’t stop replaying that (stupid, stupid) kiss. Sometimes, he imagines Kurt kissing back. Sometimes, they don't stop at kissing. He's afraid to fall asleep at night because of what his dreams might bring.  
  
He knows Kurt doesn't like him. That just makes it worse.  
  
So Dave glares at him. In the hallways, in class, in the parking lot. Sneers. Bounces him off lockers every time he walks by, knocks into him with his shoulder, elbows him hard enough to hurt. He does his best not to touch Kurt anymore, because apparently he's not so good with self-control when they’re face to face and he doesn't want to slip again, but aside from that Dave does his level best to fuck with Kurt’s head so he’ll leave him the hell alone already.  
  
Except…  
  
Except Kurt’s going out of his way to avoid him. He stays late after class and always sticks to the middle of the group whenever he and his loser friends clump together in the hallways. He flattens against his locker if he sees Dave coming, sits at the other side of the classroom, the cafeteria, and Dave thinks maybe the plan’s gotten a little confused because it turns out he’s the one who keeps pushing things, not Kurt. Pushing them and _pushing_ them, like Kurt's a bruise he can't stop prodding. It should be funny, the way Kurt gets jumpy every time he sees a letterman’s jacket or a flash of red from the corner of his eye, but instead it just makes the ugly knot in Dave's chest hitch tighter.  
  
 _Those people_ are what his parents call people like Kurt. (People like him). And every day he pushes harder (he doesn’t even know which of them he's trying to punish anymore) and eventually it all comes to a head, just as it did before.  
  
Kurt always keeps a change of clothes in his locker. One day Dave nails him with a slushie twice just because he can, decides to get him with a third one when he sees that Kurt’s changed into his gym clothes so he doesn’t have to walk around stained blue all day.   
  
"What do you want from me?” Kurt yells when Dave corners him by his locker with slushie number three. "You’ve ruined my day twice already and now I’m out two sets of clothes, so why even bother with a third time? What is the _point_ of all this?”  
  
“That’s your last set of clothes,” Dave says, smirking. It’s been a while since he’s seen Kurt mad like this. After all the threats, he’d turned turtle and nothing Dave said or did could get him riled up again. But he’s riled now, that’s for damn sure, and Dave feels sort of like he’s just thrown a rock at a hornet’s nest. It does weird things to his head. “Maybe I’m just trying to get you naked.”   
  
Like the wink had been, it’s meant to be a joke – ha ha, why would someone like him want to see a skinny little twerp like Kurt _naked_? -- but Kurt just sucks in a breath and his expression of barely-concealed horror and fear wipes the smirk right off Dave’s face.   
  
“Don’t get your panties in a wad,” he mutters, suddenly uncomfortable. “It was a joke.”  
  
“Ha freaking HA, very funny,” Kurt says. His voice is shaking and he looks, Dave notes uneasily, like he’s about to cry. “I know you’re in the middle of a giant sexual identity crisis, but could you maybe stop involving me in it? Please?”  
  
He flinches when Dave slams his fist into the locker just inches from his head.  
  
“I am _not_ having a…what it was you just said,” Dave growls. The other boy’s eyes are as bright and hard as those of a trapped animal.  
  
“Oh, right, my mistake,” Kurt says. “And here I thought I was afraid of being killed or sexually assaulted because you’re just _so completely secure_ in your heterosexuality.”  
  
Dave’s thoughts all come jumbling to a halt. “You…what?”  
  
Kurt’s jaw twitches. “I have to go,” he says. “My friends are probably wondering where I am.”  
  
He ducks underneath Dave’s arm, and this is normally the moment when he would slam Kurt back into the locker, maybe while saying something clever like, “You’ll leave when I _say_ you can, ladyface,” but he’s still reeling over the fact that Kurt is genuinely afraid of him -- not the half-angry, half-disdainful fear of before, but honest-to-God “this person is going to hurt me or worse” _fear_ \-- and lets him go. It should make him feel good, he thinks blankly as he watches Kurt retreat down the hall with his head down. He’s been trying to put the fear of God and The Fury in Kurt since middle school.  
  
It doesn’t make him feel good.   
  
It kind of makes his stomach hurt.  
  
***  
  
After that, Dave avoids him for the next three days, until Kurt’s fruity little singing club gets out around the same time practice ends and they end up alone together in the parking lot. Dave is striding over before he’s entirely aware of what he’s doing.   
  
Kurt, fussing with his messenger bag, doesn’t see Dave coming until the other boy is looming over him. He blinks, says, “What are you--?” and then he sees who it is and his eyes go wide.  
  
“I need to talk to you,” Dave says, but Kurt is already backing away with his hackles up, clutching at his bag like he’s not sure whether he wants to drop it and run or attempt to hit Dave with it. Dave grabs his arm, thinking, _You can’t walk away yet, we’re not done_ , and Kurt immediately starts twisting like an angry cat, snapping, “Get off me, get off, get _off_!” until Dave panics and lets him go.  
  
He half-expected Kurt to immediately bolt for his car, but to his surprise the other boy just rounds on him with his pretty white teeth bared like he’s about to bite.   
  
“What is WRONG with you?” Kurt yells. “Why can’t you just leave me alone?”  
  
Dave shifts, suddenly off-balance and not liking it one bit. “You’re afraid of me.”  
  
“No SHIT, Nancy Drew,” Kurt says. His nostrils are flared, and he’s so rigid you could bounce a penny off him. “Did it really take three whole days for that to sink into your thick skull, or were you just biding your time so no one would be around to help me if I screamed?”  
  
Dave really doesn’t want to know what Kurt thinks he has planned. “Screw you,” he snaps back. “I just wanted to–”  
  
“To _what_ , Karofsky? Get me naked? That’s what you wanted last time, wasn’t it?” His laugh is ragged and manic, and Dave abruptly realizes that this is a bad idea, this is a _really bad idea_ , they’re in the parking lot for fuck’s sake, and Kurt’s yanking off his blue wool coat and now his vest and he’s _unbuttoning his shirt_ , and Dave feels like his world has gone entirely off its axis and he whispers, “Wait.”  
  
Kurt just bares his teeth and keeps going, his fingers stuttering on the last of the neat white buttons. His cheeks are a dull, angry red and he’s shivering, his breath pluming in the cool air. Beneath the prim button-down he’s wearing a blue scrap of an undershirt, some silky little thing that does nothing but emphasize the hitch of his breathing and the points of his nipples against the fabric, and then his hands drop to his belt buckle and Dave's vision suddenly goes blurry at the edges.  
  
"Stop." He can barely get the word out. Everything inside his head feels raw and tangled. He wants to put his mouth on the pale hollow of Kurt’s throat. He wants Kurt to keep going, and he wants him to stop, and more than anything he wants for this to be anything other than what it is, because what it is, is _fucked up_ and he’s never going to be able to look at Kurt again without picturing this.   
  
Kurt doesn't even look at him, just angrily attacks his belt even though he's shivering too much to get the buckle undone.  
  
"Stop it," Dave says again, louder this time, "Jesus Christ, Hummel, _stop it_ ," and Kurt makes a hoarse sound that’s almost like a sob and the buckle is undone and he's fumbling with his zipper and oh God he can't, this isn't happening, he _can't_...  
  
Dave’s voice is completely frozen now, the words stuck so deep in his throat he thinks they'll never shake loose, and it’s out of sheer desperation that he grabs Kurts's wrists and forces him still. The other boy's pulse beats wildly under his fingertips; his wrists are as light as bird bones, feel just as fragile. Dave forces himself to breathe, and eventually he’s able to force out the word, “don’t.”  
  
Kurt lifts his head. His eyelashes are wet and spiky with unshed tears, but he seems to have gone strangely calm the moment Dave's hands closed around his wrists.  
  
"Karofsky,” he says quietly. “You’re shaking.”  
  
This, Dave thinks vaguely, is probably when he should be shoving Kurt away, maybe giving him a taste of The Fury for good measure. But he can't move. He can only stand there, trembling, paralyzed by the trapped-bird flutter of Kurt's pulse against the pads of his fingers and the mingled fear and want yawning cavernous in his chest. In the end, Kurt is the one who pulls away first.  
  
"This?” Kurt says. “This never happens again.” His voice is so clipped it's like he's biting off the ends of his words before they leave his mouth. He shrugs back into his vest and coat without rebuttoning his shirt, and Dave hates himself for wanting to touch the barely visible silkiness of the blue undershirt, for wanting to see if it's as soft as it looks. Kurt's mussed and shaken, and it's not appealing, it's _not_ , and to keep himself from doing something stupid Dave takes a step back and does his best to sneer.  
  
“Yeah, right,” he says. “Like I want to see your stupid faggy strip show.” It doesn’t come out nearly as harsh as he’d intended, and Kurt just looks at him as though he knows every thought that’s been skittering around in Dave’s mind.  
  
"You can't stay in denial forever, you know," he says. "It does bad things to your head. Not even you deserve that."  
  
“Fuck you, homo,” Dave spits, helpless, thinking, _I can’t, I can’t, I can’t, I can’t_. Kurt sighs and picks up his messenger bag, throws Dave a final, inscrutable look over his shoulder.  
  
“I feel sorry for you,” he says. There’s a pause, as if he’s about to say something else, but in the end he just shakes his head and heads back towards his car. He doesn’t look back.  
  
Dave goes to his own truck and punches the steering wheel until his hands stop shaking.   
  
It doesn’t help.


End file.
